I’m using Vallejo US Field Drab and I begin with several thinned coats.Ī ditched MK II tank. No-one is quite sure of the particular shade of brown used – things like RAL numbers weren’t in use back then, and it seems likely that local quartermasters would have mixed-up an approximately appropriate colour in the field. That would certainly make an interesting scheme, but after examining period photographs, I have decided to go for a “ neutral brown” finish here. It is believed that, because they were intended as training tanks, the some or all MK IIs were made from boilerplate rather than armour plate (though this is still debated) and it seems that before the battle, some may have been fitted with armoured sponsons taken from inoperative MK I s, still wearing their four colour Solomon camouflage scheme. However, there does seem to be another option – some observers at the Battle of Arras reported seeing MK II tanks where the hulls were brown but the sponsons were camouflaged. The white/red/white flashes weren’t used until later in the war, when Germany began using captured British tanks. Some were given names, which were painted on the hull sides/front, and some had three-digit serial numbers painted in yellow or white on the hull sides, in front of the sponsons (serial numbers of British tanks started with “ 701,” apparently in an effort to confuse the Germans as to how many had actually been produced). Few British tanks of this period featured markings. The finish, especially on the sponson where it isn’t smeared in mud, looks to be a uniform colour.

A ditched MK II Male tank after the Battle of Arras.

1960s airfix assault force tanks